S Class

Hambone - sorry I missed your reply :(

Over here in the UK the take up has been slow which is probably down to lack of publicity, however we have some clubs who will be adopting the discipline in the new year and a fair amount of interest in the postal side of things which is embarrassing as I have not managed to find anyone to do the graphics for the A4 Pdf targets yet... (Anyone here any good at such things?)

As far as the 'Deer legal' side of things goes, well that is a UK thing and is probably confusing matters so think of it as 6.5mm and above. The interesting part is the choice of rifle and cartridge seems to vary from person to person with no common theme, I am shooting a 6,5-284, my wife for the first time in her life has actually gone out and found a .308 (Tikka) just for the discipline, we have one person shooting a 257 Roberts AI and the 6,5x55SE seems to have a few followers as does the .308 and I suspect the low recoil 6,5's such as the x47 Lapua are going to do very well in the class.

Because the class is weight limited at 6Kgs with, maximum of 26" barrel and 12x magnification scope with a Harris type bipod with no rear bag it should make it far more attainable for many club shooters and hunters who would like to shoot in competition but are put off by the potentially huge costs of the F Classes.

2013 is going to be a very interesting year for this and to see a few clubs/shooters try this in the USA and other countries would be fantastic.

http://sporting-class.com

David
 
The evolution of "F" class has been fascinating to me. From the "any rifle, any sight, fired from any rest", as put forth by the originator, George Farquharson, it has evolved into a multitude of contentious variations. Along the way, some of the fun has gone out.
I have a personal prefernce for what I like to term "practical" rifle (maybe I could call it "P" class!). So most of my rifles look like 1960's prone rifles and weigh 12 to 14 pounds. One 308 is only 11. I have one heavy rifle for when I'm feeling serious.
I actually like the idea of the sporting rifle class and I actually think the weight should have been restricted a bit more in the original "F" class rules but they were not so here we are. Regards, Bill
 
Lurker of sorts here, just picked up on this topic.

Here in NL F-Class is a goner as they closed down the last MoD range and we are left with only a single 300m range. Hence I make some extra trips to Bisley besides the Phoenix/Imperial/Euros to shoot F/Open. Don't know if there are any familiars on here, as I only see the forum names :) Dutchguy here with the blue/gray laminated 10kg rifle ;)

Anyways... the whole rat race of big/bigger/biggest/even biggerest is taking a toll here as well, the fun is going out of it with component prices and what it costs me to go over there all the time. We've started a 100m prone competition here to make a surrogate for F-Class as many people had F rifles and now have nothing to shoot with them. We borrowed F/O and F/TR rules as to caliber and weight, but no rear support other than your bare hand and only a bipod that is quickly collapsable and foldable (ie Harris) to keep it fair and from becoming prone Benchrest (and again a money race).

We kept the 8.25/10kg limits but we are seeing people who are going over and coming up with all sorts of things to get an edge but that were never "in the spirit" of this competition. Unlike F-Class we don't want this to become a technology testing ground to see how far we can take it, but to use good rifles yet still have the shooter be the main factor in this equasion. It's proving difficult to keep it like that and not upset a group of people. We are now in year 8 of this discipline and it's been accepted as an official discipline by our national governing body.

In short... I feel for you and see what you're trying to do.
 
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